A  growing coalition of over 140 Vancouver Island residents has called for strategic voting in the North Island-Powell River and Courtenay-Alberni ridings to block the Conservatives and reject Aaron Gunn’s divisive politics.

The coalition says in a new release that they encourage voters to stop the Conservatives by voting for the NDP who are the incumbent party in both ridings and are historically strong on Vancouver Island. This recommendation is backed by independent strategic-voting sites such as votewell.ca and smartvoting.ca.

The release was signed by a diverse group of community members, organizations, and Indigenous leaders from across North Island-Powell River and Courtenay-Alberni ridings.

National media narratives may lead people to assume that voting Liberal will stop the Conservatives. However, this assumption does not reflect the local realities on Vancouver Island. Increased support for the Liberals on Vancouver Island will split the progressive vote. If the Liberals do well this will most likely elect Gunn.

The network encourages Liberal, Green, Conservative, and non-voters from the last election to vote NDP.

In the coming weeks, members of the grassroots network say they will mobilize to get out the vote through door knocking, phone calling, and peer-to-peer engagement.

To get involved, the public can go here, or here.